'Trust me, life is much easier with a sand wedge than a four-iron'

It looks like a golf ball but soars through the crisp, clean air of Loch Lomond with the aerodynamics of a house brick, judging by the pained expression on Gary Orr's face. "I'll never reach the green from here," says the former European Tour rookie of the year. Indeed he will not. Not on a 443-yard hole, not into the wind and not even with a brilliantly struck three-wood. A lay-up on a par-four. Oh, the indignity of it all.

It is just as well Orr is one of those professional golfers whose ego is smaller than the big-headed driver he carries in his bag, although even he looks a little deflated as he surveys the outcome of the shot he has just played. "That's pretty poor. Very poor indeed."

Welcome, Gary, to golf circa 1985, before titanium-faced clubs, before Tiger Woods and before Jack Nicklaus began his long and vocal campaign to force golf's governing bodies - the R&A and the USGA - to "do something" about the ball. The great man was at it again last week - "When will they wake up? The golf ball is out of bounds, way out of bounds. It is making the great golf courses obsolete" - and no doubt he will be singing the same tune at St Andrews this week.

Nicklaus is right, but the golf ball market is worth an estimated £1.7bn a year and this constant stream of negative publicity has provoked one ball manufacturer into an angry, sarcastic response to the greatest player that has ever lived. This summer the unidentified company produced a set of golf balls to mid-1980s specifications which carried the words "RIP Distance" on one side and "This is the ball Jack wants you to hit" on the other.

These balls have already attained mythical status in golfing circles and are much sought after by collectors. Only a few dozen are in existence and one of them - obtained by The Guardian - is sitting on the second fairway at Loch Lomond having flown the grand total of 238 yards off Orr's driver clubface. The last time he hit a drive that short he was a teenager. "I actually hit this one better than my normal ball and look how far behind I am - 50 yards," he says.

Orr's normal ball is a Titleist Pro-V1 - the most popular in professional golf and the ball credited with changing (or ruining, depending on your viewpoint) the face of the game. There is little agreement on exactly how much further the modern golf ball flies compared to its predecessor, but there is no dispute that it does. For instance, Orr's average driving distance in 1998 was 267 yards.This year it is 285 yards.

Golf statistics, like any, can be manipulated to support a case. But who can argue with the outcome of a match around Loch Lomond's picturesque front nine; one man, one set of clubs and, most importantly, two balls - the ball that Gary hits, and "the ball Jack wants you to hit"?

It's game on, and after one hole the match is all square. "My prediction is the old ball will get slaughtered," Orr said on the first tee. "The main problem is the way it spins. The new ball doesn't spin so much, which means it won't be affected by the wind as much as the old ball."

As it turns out, the first hole is downwind and the old ball is barely affected. Even so, the differences are already apparent. The new ball sounds more solid when it is struck and flies in an unwavering arc; the old ball is softer and it seems to float rather than fly.

There is a good reason for this: the modern ball, thanks to its aerodynamic dimple pattern, is basically a perfect sphere. The older ball is only "85% round" thanks to the flat spots created by deeper dimples. Still, Orr is pleasantly surprised to find his first drive with the old ball is only 20 yards shorter. He hits a seven-iron (as opposed to an eight-iron with the new ball) on to the green and two-putts for a par.

It's a different story on the second. His three-wood second shot falls 20 yards short of the green, but a four-iron with the new ball leaves him pin-high. The third is a par-five, easily reached with the modern ball, but not with the old. Birdie beats par; two up to modernity.

Holes four and five - a short par-four and a par-three, both downwind - offer a more equitable contest. Indeed, Orr manages to hole a birdie putt with the old ball to pull one back. "It actually feels really nice coming off the putter, as long as you remember it's softer and you've got to hit it harder."

The sixth, a 625-yard par-five, provides the crux of the match, as well as the crux of the argument about the modern ball. It It wasn't so long ago that a 600-yard hole was unimaginable, but these days such manicured monstrosities are a regular feature of professional golf tournaments. The traditional par-five - measuring 520 to 560 yards - can now be reached in two shots by virtually every player on tour. The intention of the 600-yard hole is to reintroduce the par-five to the game. The reality is the likes of Tiger Woods simply hit the ball harder and can still reach the green in two shots. "What's next?" says Orr, teeing up his Pro-V1. "The 700-yard golf hole?"

Orr is no Tiger Woods, but even so, two well-struck shots leave him only 60 yards short of the green. From there it's a flick with a sand wedge and one putt for birdie. Simple, and a stunning contrast to what happened with the old ball. Admittedly, he didn't hit his drive very well but, as he points out, he "didn't hit 110 yards worse". (Another benefit of the modern ball is that bad shots go further than they used to - a consequence of its lower spin rate.)

There is a set of bunkers 150 yards short of the green. Orr is so far back off the tee that he has to lay up short of them, leaving himself with 187 yards into the flag for his third. He hits a terrific four-iron to 15 feet and holes the putt for birdie.

"The problem is I can't keep getting up and down from 187 yards. With the new ball it is much easier to negotiate your way round the newer golf courses. Most of the tournament courses we see these days would be impossible to play with the old ball," he says, wearily heading off to the seventh tee. "Trust me, life is much easier with a sand wedge in your hands rather than a four-iron."

So it proves on the seventh. Two good drives leave him facing a five-iron with the old ball and eight-iron with the new. He hits both shots well, but whereas the new ball lands pin-high, the old ball is carried by the wind into the greenside bunker. Two up to modernity. The ball that Jack wants you to hit has a chance to pull one back on the par-three eighth but the birdie putt lips out. "Old ball, new ball - some things never change," Orr says.

It's game over. Modernity wins by two holes. Orr doesn't congratulate himself and heads up the ninth fairway, where his drive with the old ball leaves him with a sand wedge into the green. "To be honest, I would be happy to play with the old ball. Believe it or not, I like the way it feels," he reflects. "I think if you asked the guys in the locker room most of them would say the same - as long as we all played a ball with similar properties."

With that thought, Orr hits his final shot with "the ball Jack wants you to hit". For once, it's badly struck and the ball takes a wicked kick off the greenside hump and bounces off into the long grass. "God, I hope we find it," he says anxiously. "It's not a collectible, is it?"